WASHINGTON — A federal judge in Washington has dismissed a lawsuit by Belmont Abbey College against the federal contraception mandate as being premature.

Hannah Smith, senior legal counsel at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, which was representing Belmont Abbey College in the case, said that the decision was made “on technical grounds.”

Smith explained in a statement that “the judge thinks that the case should be delayed for a matter of months” in order to give the federal government time to “fix” the mandate.

On July 18, federal judge James Boasberg dismissed the suit filed by the Catholic liberal arts school last year. The suit is the second of the nearly two dozen cases against the mandate to be thrown out.

The judge determined that the case was not yet “ripe for decision” because the concerns were still too “speculative.”

He noted that the federal government has indicated that it intends to issue future rules on the implementation of the mandate being challenged in the case.

That mandate — issued under the authority of the Affordable Care Act — will soon require employers and colleges to offer health-insurance plans covering contraception, sterilization and abortion-inducing drugs, even if doing so violates their firmly-held religious convictions.

Belmont Abbey filed a lawsuit arguing that the mandate violated its religious freedom last November, becoming the first group to do so. Dozens of other organizations followed in the college’s footsteps over the months that followed.

In total, 23 lawsuits have been filed by more than 50 plaintiffs, including schools, charitable agencies, states, dioceses and private business owners.

On July 17, a judge in Nebraska dismissed another of the lawsuits, similarly ruling that it was not clear that the plaintiffs would suffer immediate harm from the mandate.

In both decisions, the judges pointed to the administration’s promise to “accommodate” the religious-freedom concerns of objecting groups.

However, critics have voiced concern about whether the “accommodation” will be sufficient. They have noted that the mandate was finalized in law months ago, but the accommodation has merely been promised and not placed in law or even formally proposed.

Smith emphasized that this ruling “says nothing about the merits of Belmont Abbey’s religious-freedom claims and has no effect on any of the 22 other cases currently pending in federal court.”

“It simply delays Belmont Abbey College’s ability to challenge the mandate for a few months,” she said.

Smith stressed that “the court made clear we have the right to re-file the case” if concerns with the mandate are not adequately addressed.

While she said that the group is currently “considering our options,” Smith made it clear that the battle for religious freedom was not over: “Belmont Abbey College and the Becket Fund will continue the fight for religious liberty, even if this case is delayed for a few months.”

Comments

The mandate cannot be “fixed,” because the mandate itself is the problem: As long as the HHS Secretary has the power to mandate what health insurance companies must pay for, there is the danger that they will be forced to pay for things that they believe are wrong. Not only does she now have the power to force all health insurance companies to pay for abortion, contraception, and sterilization, she can force them to pay for assisted-suicide as well: look at The Affordable Care ACT, section 1553, “Prohibition against discrimination on assisted suicide.” Although it begins by saying that nobody will be forced to perform “assisted suicide, euthanasia, or mercy killing,” two paragraphs later, it subtly defines such acts as “services.” It outlines these “services” to include the killing of a person, either directly (in the womb) or indirectly (by neglect, starvation, dehydration, or “unintendedly,” through potentially lethal pain-relievers). Furthermore, section 1302 gives the HHS Secretary the power to require all health insurance companies to pay for these “services:” All she has to do is say that they are “essential” health services. (As if “public health” could be pursued by killing people!—-Impossible!—-The end never justifies the means; therefore, murder is not health care—-period. We would be deceiving ourselves if we tried to take an account of “public health” without first considering the health of each individual.) But we are not just speculating here, these “services” are already happening—many elderly persons are suffering neglect because they signed a DNR, and many others are suffering dehydration and starvation because they signed a living will—-and how many of them actually read what they signed? Most of us have probably experienced this first-hand. What we may be shocked to learn is that children with detected genetic disorders are being killed before they even have a chance to draw breath—-is this a “service” to our society?—-It seems unbleievable, that we would begin to practice eugenics, like the NAZIS did not too long ago, but it’s really happening: consider the testimony of Dr Paul Byrne at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1krxaz8tOw&feature=plcp

Posted by Lawrence R Rosano on Monday, Jul 23, 2012 2:39 AM (EDT):

The only way to defeat the HHS mandate and the February 10 concession against the Catholic Church is to make them both unconstitutional explained at: http://UnbornJustice.blogspot.com Briefly, for 50 years now attorneys like Hanna White are blind to believe that the law is what the U. S. Supreme court says it is. WRONG. In Sherbert v. Verner - a case
which was responsible for coercing the Catholic Church on March 1, 2004 in CA to sponsor contraception in group health insurance [“GHI”] - was based on a judicial lie or a religious error no lawyer has ever discovered until I a non-layer legal researcher did in 2002. Don’t believer me? Read my blog above and proper to me I am wrong. Listen, if you do not believe me that Hanna and all attorneys are blind to my unique discovery then prove it in a memorandum of law I an analyzed how you are wrong. Attorneys will not talk to me because they can’t believe for 50 years they missed something I picked up and I am not even an attorney! On the page 1 to another blog I present my definition which will uplift religious freedom at http”//ProlifeTaxStrike.blogspot.com

Posted by ANNE on Sunday, Jul 22, 2012 7:37 AM (EDT):

The Judge has no legal basis that HHS (the Obama Administration) will fix the mandate. This is expecially true since the President has lied regarding his Oath of Office to uphold the US Constitution.

When Catholics vote for evil politicans, they can expect that they will appoint evil Judges and evil Administrators of like mind.

On the internet, please read “Worthiness to Receive Holy Communion, General Principles” by Cardinal Ratzinger (Pope Benedict).
And let’s remember that there is nothing proportionate in the USA today to the murder of approx 1 MILLION innocent babies each year.

Posted by Joseph Condon on Saturday, Jul 21, 2012 9:33 AM (EDT):

Lawyers refer to technicalities as laws.

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